Description

Faber are pleased to announce the relaunch of the poetry list - starting in Spring 2001 and continuing, with publication dates each month, for the rest of the year. This will involve a new jacket design recalling the typographic virtues of the classic Faber poetry covers, connecting the backlist and the new titles within a single embracing cover solution. A major reissue program is scheduled, to include classic individual collections from each decade, some of which have long been unavailable: Wallace Stevens's Harmonium and Ezra Pound's Personae from the 1920s; W.H. Auden's Poems (1930); Robert Lowell's Life Studies from the 1950s; John Berryman's 77 Dream Songs and Philip Larkin's The Whitsun Weddings from the 1960s; Ted Hughes's Gaudete and Seamus Heaney's Field Work from the 1970s; Michael Hofmann's Acrimony and Douglas Dunn's Elegies from the 1980s. Timed to celebrate publication of Seamus Heaney's new collection, Electric Light, the relaunch is intended to re-emphasize the predominance of Faber Poetry, and to celebrate a series which has played a shaping role in the history of modern poetry since its inception in the 1920s.show more

About Robert Lowell

Robert Lowell (1917-1977) was born in Boston. He was recognised as an accomplished poet in his own lifetime, and along with Elizabeth Bishop, John Berryman and Sylvia Plath he created the fashion and generated the force of American poetry over the 1950s, 60s, and 70s. Life Studies, published in 1959, marked a watershed. It initiated an autobiographical project which would dominate his oeuvre thereafter, and is now regarded as one of the most influential books of the century. He received a Pulitzer Prize for Lord Weary's Castle (1946) and another for The Dolphin (1973).show more

Review Text

A new book of poems by Pulitzer Prize Winning author of the memorable Lord Weary's Castle is always a literary event. Since his last book, The Mills of the Kavanaughs appeared in 1951 we have heard nothing from this gifted poet. Now in Life Studies he gives brief but scintillating glimpses of his life and experiences over years that have offered far reaches, but at their end he is still the Puritan (member of a renowned family), a Catholic convert, and still reliving his relationships with Mother, Father, uncles and a grandfather. And mentally he seems still to be beating against the poles of introversion and release. The particulars of his poems are, as always, "powerful, homely, grotesque but exactly appropriate." His work is highly organized and intense. It still has "thrust and density." And besides these familiar qualities, there is a new and touching one in his sensitive handling of personal relationships. When Lord Weary's Castle first appeared, Lowell was compared with Auden. While his own niche is still secure, this volume would not seem to bear out that promise. A fine talent, which perhaps needs a broadened horizon. This is an essential item for all lovers of poetic literature. (Kirkus Reviews)show more